No place to hide….my clutter
Sometimes when I see these shows like Trading Spaces or any of those “Pimp My McMansion” things on the decorating networks, this thought pops into my brain: mmmm, closets…. mmmm, spare bedrooms. It’s just that when you live in a closet yourself, that is a Manhattan 1-bedroom, you envy these types of places. I mean, not the lawns or the ridiculous atrium-like entranceways, just the fact that when people come over, you have somewhere to stuff the piles of things you have around. I have plenty of closets, I’m lucky that way, but they are full of things that actually belong there like clothes and towels. But what about the junk? Baby, baby, where does our junk go? Let me just admit here that I have occasionally resorted to tossing things in the bathtub just to hide the clutter when someone comes over.
This is why I am fantastically delighted that after a long wait I have been granted storage space in my building’s basement at the bargain price of $25 a month. There’s a waiting list but I’m the most senior person on it and finally, finally they granted me the magical key to the dirty, prison-like storage room. I get a cage of an area that’s about 5 feet wide and 8 feet long and man, do I have some stuff to cram in there.
I took a look around at everyone else’s and they all seemed to be the kind of things that you could put in long term storage like an easy chair or neatly piled boxes. Come ON. Where are the bags of old letters and the piles of Cooking Light magazines that you’re sure you’ll use one day but are just an eyesore today? And how about all the gifts people give you that you have no earthly use for but feel guilty enough to keep? Who are these neighbors of mine?
But mine will be different and since the ceiling is high, I can just keep throwing things on top until I open the door one day and get killed by a pile of my own crap. But at least when you visit me you’ll admire how tidy things are and how simply I live. It’s a trade-off I’m willing to make.
